


The Long Game

by Fourier



Series: The Fake AH Crew (& all their demons) [5]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: F/M, Fake AH Crew, GTA AU, Homophobic Language, M/M, Mentions of Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-20
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 08:14:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4618068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fourier/pseuds/Fourier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Ramsey’s boys,” the city calls out. “Oh,” it huffs, “and Pattillo.”</p><p>She doesn’t mind being 'and Pattillo' most days, though. It makes it easier. </p><p>-</p><p>In which Jack, behind-the-scenes crew leader Jack, matchmaker Jack, tries her best to get Michael to admit his boner for Geoff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Plan A

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading! I really am going to finish this series, I promise.
> 
> Also in re the homophobic language tag: Ray says the word "queers" in a derogatory way. Ray, however, is incredibly bisexual in this story, as I am incredibly bisexual in real life, so it's meant to be more self-deprecating than anything else. I still wanted to warn everybody about it just in case.

A few things to know about Jack:

• She left home at fourteen to fucking survive and she’s been thriving ever since  
• She first killed someone when she was seventeen and it left a buzzing in her head  
• It made her feel alive  
• She became the Queen of Los Santos at twenty-four and won’t ever let go  
• She’s in love with Geoff Ramsey, but then,  
• She’s a little in love with everyone in her crew. And  
• It is, absolutely, undeniably, _her_ crew.

It is not, it has never been, a motherly love for them. It is a love that comes with ferocity, a possessiveness. It’s the love she has for herself split five ways and expanded into universes within each of them. She fought for that love. Clawed it out of hiding fourteen years into life. 

Geoff helped, of course. He may even think he did it himself. He usually does.

_Ramsey’s_ boys. She laughs a little every time she hears it. As if he had ever dreamed bigger than _him_ and _her_ , taking the city by storm from within. As if he had looked at Michael on the news that night years ago and seen anything other than those freckles, imagined anything other than burying his hands in those curls. As if that night, when he told her as much, he had been the one to lean in and whisper _let’s start a crew._

“Ramsey’s boys,” the city calls out. “Oh,” it huffs, “and Pattillo.”

She doesn’t mind being _and Pattillo_ most days, though. It makes it easier. 

She’s standing with arms crossed behind those boys as they all listen to Geoff’s new elaborate scheme, half whimsy and half calculation. Gavin with hands on his fists leaning forward. Ray with feet up on the table, tilted back in his chair so his head practically rests against Ryan’s lap. Ryan smirking and—from the way his fingers are twitching—fighting the urge to either push Ray over or card his fingers through that soft black hair. And Michael, loose and easy in his chair, one arm thrown over the back, eyes trailing Geoff with every move he makes. 

“Jack,” Geoff says, and that’s her cue to start listening (because god knows she knows Geoff cold by now, doesn’t need to hear the rest of the plan to know what it is exactly). She perks her head up and he nods. “You’re piloting the jet, obviously.”

“Obviously,” she agrees. 

“Land it out in the desert, nice and smooth, call in our back-up—” he jams a marker point into the whiteboard just off-map, indicating desert, “and get the fuck out of dodge, easy as that.”

“Bevs in the jet while we wait?” Gavin pipes up.

“Gavino, if you make it that far, we will absolutely have bevs. Your treat.”

She sees the laugh in his eyes at the same time as she sees the twitch in his mouth. How he loves to tease Gavin about getting taken out. How he hates to imagine it. 

He doesn’t seem to realize sometimes he’s just as destructible as the rest of them. Or maybe it’s just not quite as important to him. 

“Alright, break?” Geoff announces, and they parrot back _break_. They stand up and push their way out, Ray almost tripping, Ryan almost catching him. She wonders how long it’s going to be before the two of them realize they’re a thing. Hopefully, for both their sakes, not as long as it took her and Geoff. 

She starts making herself a drink at the kitchen counter as the rest of them wander off to their rooms and their games. She’ll join them eventually. Just gotta prepare herself for the idea of flying a jet tomorrow.

She doesn’t much like flying. It’s a god damn shame she’s so good at it.

“Hey, barkeep,” comes Michael’s voice behind her, and when she turns around he’s settling into a stool and sliding a hundred dollar bill her way. “Can I get what you’re having?”

“Sure,” she says, and snatches his money before he can slide it back towards himself. He makes a grab at it and she shoves it down the front of her shirt, winking. He lets his hands fall back to his sides after that, indignant. “Jack and coke?”

They’re both too bored of the joke to make it, so he just nods. 

While she mixes in the whiskey his eyes drift over to the couch. To Geoff. She glances up every now and then to catch the look in his eye and admire it.

She knows what love looks like. Especially love for Geoff Ramsey; they all have it, one way or another. That’s why they’re here. Why they stay here. It looks different in all their eyes: Gavin = admiration, Ray = obedience, Ryan = awe, Jack = adoration, and Michael = …. 

She has to admit she’s still working on that one. 

It could be sexual. It could easily be, given the way he looks at Geoff sometimes, the way he licks his lips and shakes himself when he thinks nobody is looking, the way most of the one-night stands he thinks they don’t notice him sneaking away with look like stock photo models, the most generic, societally-approved picture of A Woman that he can find. But she thinks it probably goes a little deeper than that.

“Ready for the heist tomorrow?” she asks as she pushes his drink towards him. He takes a long sip and nods approvingly before answering.

“Fuck yeah I’m ready,” he assures her. “Gotten fucking _bored_ around here lately. Not that I don’t love counting my money while playing Halo 4, but,” he cuts himself off with a shrug and she laughs. 

“I get it,” she says, because God, does she ever. They’re all a little self-destructive to some extent—maybe another reason they all love Geoff—but Michael is like a time bomb that constantly needs to be reset, with C-4 or TNT or miniguns. 

“Anyway, seems straightforward enough,” he says, taking another long swallow. 

“Hmm,” is what Jack offers back, prompting him to look up at her. “Oh, nothing,” she says ‘innocently’. “Seemed pretty focused during the meeting. Maybe it wasn’t the plan, though.”

He rolls his eyes. Always, he rolls his eyes: never says no, never says yes. Just that eye roll. 

“For the last time, Pattillo,” he says, “I’m not gonna steal your man.”

“For the last time, Jones,” she retorts, topping off his drink, “He’s not my man.”

Michael rolls his eyes again, and _let’s get married_ rings in her ears, and _rob a fucking jewelry store next_ bounces about in her head, and _I can’t wait to tear a wedding dress off of you._

He’s always been his own kind of romantic, that one. But she’s not lying. He’s not her man. They don’t fucking belong to each other, that’s something they decided early on. They’re okay with being something other people don’t understand. 

“If you say so,” Michael says, and she indulges him a little.

“As sure as you are straight,” she says, and takes a sip from her drink while raising an eyebrow at him. 

He doesn’t miss a beat. Just leans back, hands on the countertop, and wails, “ _Ge-eoff_ , your fiancée is hassling me about my sexuality again.”

“Damn it, Jack,” Geoff shouts back, “what did I say about harassing the staff? No heterophobia allowed in this penthouse.”

“Yeah, you fucking queers,” Ray chimes in, probably between gazing into Ryan’s big blue eyes and palming his dick. (Or maybe Gavin, these days. She finds it hard to keep track.) 

“See?” Michael insists, leaning forward. “Maybe you should watch your attitude next time.”

“Maybe you should watch your semi,” she counters, glancing down at his crotch. She has no idea if she’s right, but he does blush and pretend he doesn’t. And that’s promising. 

“Hey, ginger bastards,” Gavin shouts from the other room. “Come join us, would you?”

Michael pushes away from the table first, grabbing his drink with him. “Calm your fucking tits,” he shouts back. “We’re coming, Jesus!”

Jack follows him with a grin, shaking her head. Watches him settle into the couch in the living room, just slightly far enough away from Geoff for it to be a conscious action. She leans down over the back of the couch and grabs a controller from Geoff’s lap, making sure she notices Michael watch her hands as he does. 

Because look, Michael might have a strong preference for women, but she’s going to tease the word _bisexual_ out of him someday if she has to do it with Geoff’s mouth around his cock.

Jack Pattillo plays the long game, ladies, gentlemen, and neither of the above. 

She presses _Enter Game_ and prepares to beat the virtual shit out of Ramsey and his boys.


	2. Plan C

Jack’s been a criminal for roughly twenty years and no one’s ever knocked on her door at three in the morning for a good reason.

So when she hears that pounding at her door, and Michael’s sing-song voice lilting, _“Ja-ack, come o-on,"_ she checks the time and groans. 

Options: tell Michael to go back to sleep; ignore him and pretend to go back to sleep; go see what the hell he wants.

Outcomes: not gonna happen; probably impossible; oh for the love of God, _fine._

She throws open the door and pushes him back with one hand to his chest before he can even think about waking up Geoff along with her. For Jack getting back to sleep is a matter of inconvenience. For Geoff it’s a fucking ritual, one she doesn’t feel like partaking in just at the moment.

“What is it?” she hisses as he stumbles backwards into the living room. “Why are you up this late? And this drunk, I might add.”

“I’m not that drunk,” Michael protests. She chances another look at him. True, he’s not falling-over drunk, not loud-and-angry drunk, but he’s definitely more than tipsy. Impaired judgment, too jittery, like he’s keyed up and there’s not a thing in the world that could key him down. 

“Tell that to the glass of water I’m fixing for you,” she sighs. He follows her to the kitchen like a lost puppy.

“I just wanted to talk to you,” he slurs. “I needed to talk to you, Jack, c’mon, don’t be a bitch. That’s Ray’s job.”

Jack rolls her eyes but keeps making his god damn glass of ice water anyway. “I’m here,” she snaps. “Regrettably. Now what did you need to talk to me about at three in the fucking morning?”

She sets the glass of water down in front of him and looks him in the eye, forcing him to hold that gaze. He does, for a bit longer than she expected. She thought he was just going to glare at her, lean in, and mumble some mundane thing about a job or a heist or an episode of Always Sunny. But there’s something in his eyes that’s not excited, not desperate to talk to her: just a little afraid. Something he couldn’t quite drink away.

“You were right,” he mumbles, and cautiously sips at his glass. “You _are_ right, I mean.”

“Yes,” she says flatly. “Usually. Gonna have to be more specific.”

His fingers hem and haw at the condensation on the outside of the glass and she waits. 

“Me,” he finally says. “Geoff. Me and Geoff. Me and my fucking god damn boner for Geoff.”

“Oh,” she says, standing up, and then: “ _Oh._ ”

“Happy?” he says, wincing as he takes another drink, and no. No, she realizes, she’s not. She wanted to know—or, she already knew, but she wanted to hear him say it—but not like this. Not drunk and miserable like he’s at confessional. 

“I feel like I don’t have to tell you of all people you don’t have to be ashamed of that,” she says. 

“I’m not fucking ashamed,” he spits back, looking up at her with those wet, sad eyes that make her want to ask _are you sure?_ “This is just fucking bullshit, you know? Like, I’m straight for what, twenty fucking years, or I’m pretty straight or whatever, and then I move in here and just because everyone else is gay as fuck or whatever—”

He shuts his mouth with a great deal of effort, shakes his head in that way he does when he’s trying to dislodge a thought. She wonders if she should reach across the counter and put her palm against his cheek, give him the physicality that melts the boy like warm butter. But she thinks he might cry if she does that and she doesn’t want him dissolving just yet.

“Not everybody knows right away,” she says gently, feeling like a brochure. “So what if it takes twenty years?”

He wants to believe her. She can see that. He wants to nod, thank her, go to bed, and jerk off to the thoughts of Geoff’s tattoos or whatever the fuck he does. But the shallow up-and-down of his chest is still fighting against it. 

“That’s not who I am, Jack,” he insists. “That’s not who I’m fucking supposed to be, you know?”

She lets out a shaky and half-amused breath. And yeah, she knows. Michael the token straight one. Jack the runaway boy. That’s who they’ve built themselves on, those are the labels they’ve pinned to their shirts and worn with pride. That’s who they’re supposed to be. 

“It can be,” she says. “You don’t _have_ to be anything, Michael.”

He’s long stopped drinking his ice water, which he’s going to regret in a few hours, but she’s done her part. He just traces his fingers through the water rings on the counter. “It’s fucking bullshit,” he repeats. 

“Yeah,” she laughs. “Welcome to sexuality.”

He at least gives her a laugh for that one, which she graciously accepts.

“I don’t want to date him,” Michael blurts out. “Like, I don’t wanna fucking marry him or whatever you guys are doing.”

“Good, because polygamy is still outlawed in California,” Jack says smoothly. He glares at her interruption and she shrugs innocently. Nonetheless, he’s out of steam again, and she’s gotta pick up where he left off. “You’re physically attracted to him,” she supplies. “And other men, probably, I’d assume. But it’s not a romantic inclination.”

He plays with the glass again and shrugs and she knows that’s the closest she’s getting to a yes during this particular conversation.

“Okay,” she shrugs. “So sleep with him.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You say it like it’s that fucking easy.”

“It _is_ that fucking easy.”

And she watches that little universe expand behind his eyes, the sudden realization that she’s right. That he can have this. He can be this.

She doesn’t get tired of that moment, not ever.

He tries to squash it down again, maybe out of reflex, with a mumbled, “Not looking forward to the I told you so part.”

Jack smirks. “Yeah,” she admits. “We work with a bunch of assholes. At least you’ve got a semi-automatic.”

He laughs again, more of a snort than anything else. It’s still unfolding within him, she knows. It might take a few hours, days, weeks. She doesn’t know how long it took her; it was growing somewhere before she allowed herself to look at it, poke and prod, and she knows it’s been the same for him. 

“You should sleep on it,” she says gently when she realizes the far-away look in his eyes is more than half exhaustion. “Before you sleep with my fiancé.”

“Yeah,” Michael admits, standing up on wobbly legs. She’s prepared to jump out and right him if he stumbles over, but she doesn’t. “Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Jack.”

“Anytime,” she says, and then, “Okay, maybe at a more reasonable hour next time, but you know what I mean.”

He snorts again. “Thanks, Jack,” he repeats, and pads off to bed. 

Jack watches him and makes sure his door is shut firmly behind him before she tilts her head up to the sky.

“Fucking _finally_ ,” she mutters, and goes to crawl back into bed with Geoff. 

-

He doesn’t bring it up the next day—just pops two aspirin and nods at her. Or the day after that. Or for about two weeks following.

She’s just about ready to start wondering if he’d forgotten the entire drunken confession when suddenly their schedules catch the two of them alone in the penthouse. Jack’s between business calls—okay, business threats might be a more accurate description—and Michael’s just trying to practice throwing knives in the living room for a bet.

“So,” Michael says, clears his throat, pulls a knife out of the drywall. “What does Geoff like?”

“What?” Jack says absently, trying to sort through her papers.

“You know,” Michael says, tossing the knife by the hilt in his palm. “Like. What does Geoff _like._ ”

Jack, with sudden clarity, looks up. “In _bed_?”

Michael gives her a look that he probably thinks is innocent.

“Jesus Christ,” she laughs. “From zero to sixty in two weeks flat, huh?”

Michael folds his arms. “I’m trying to be prepared, okay?”

Jack raises her hands, palms to him. “Okay, okay,” she agrees. “I get it. I don’t have much for you, though. He’s… charmingly vanilla.”

“Charmingly vanilla,” Michael repeats with acid on his tongue. He throws the knife back into the wall. “That’s just my fucking luck.”

Jack laughs, forgetting about the piece of paper she was looking for, and Michael gives her a Cheshire grin that she knows, for once, isn’t hiding anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys for reading!! <3


End file.
